The day after the feast, I woke up with a very light headache and an overall soreness that wasn’t all that unpleasant. Especially remembering what Sigmir and I had been up to after the feast to get said soreness and with that in mind, it wasn’t unpleasant at all. Our plan was to have breakfast in Ashenforge Hold before starting out again, travelling roughly south-west again, not following the path we had taken here. Sure, the Pegaeae had been overall friendly but also a little pushy, her attention making me feel uncomfortable. Instead, we simply planned to move through the countryside until we got back to the old, imperial road, much further west.

Overall, we simply wanted to get to the western edge of the continent, what would be Portugal on Earth, looking for a way to cross over the ocean. It was still a massive distance but we had managed to cover a good portion of it, despite the many detours we had gone on. Unless things went completely contrary to plan, we would be able to reach the Nexus in the southern part of Arbotoma with time to spare. There, I would have to find out what I was carrying with me, decide if I wanted to free it and, if I wanted to, figure out how to do so.

Once again, I had to smile at the idea, the discongruity of looking at a quest like that from a realistic, as much as that applied, perspective instead of a game-perspective. Thinking in terms of games and the quests people had been sent on in past games, it was par for the course, a group of people travelling to free some ancient being, a plotline that could be used for either the protagonist or the antagonist, depending on the ancient entity and their motives.

But if I looked at it from a realistic perspective, the idea that I was carrying the soul of a literal God, ancient Dragon, mythical beast or some other eldritch being with me, powerful enough to necessitate its sealing because Death was merely a temporary inconvenience for it, that put a different spin on it. What on Mundus was I doing?

It also made me wonder whether Pantheon was going to abandon the customary attempt to allow everyone to experience every player every part of the game or if they would put in parts that were restricted to only those who invested the time and effort, combined with the skill, to get there. If they were to try, things would be problematic, especially with quests like the one I was trying to complete. A just reward to such a quest would be almost earth-shattering but trying to give everyone such a quest would destroy the realistic world Pantheon had set up. The effort involved in the quest made it restricted in the beta but what when the time-restriction wasn’t there any longer? Would people simply take their time to complete such a quest and emerge with whatever reward I got at the end or would there be another restriction?

“What heavy thoughts are you thinking before breakfast?” Sigmir’s voice asked, just before she started to nibble at my ears. They weren’t as long and pointy as in some depictions of elves, roughly the same size as human ears, just not as round, and highly sensitive. Just the gentle nibbling was enough to chase all thought from my mind and Sigmir’s arms made sure that I wouldn’t be able to escape her, if I even wanted to.

Our planned breakfast was a little later than intended, especially because Sigmir and I had to make use of the shower after our morning gymnastics but it wasn’t as if we were on an actual schedule, with people waiting for us. No, we just had a few thousand miles to travel about seventeen months to do so. The only question was just how much trouble we could get into on the way.

“Let’s head out.” I told the others, once we had eaten and made sure that nothing was left behind in our quarters and it was reasonably clean. leaving a mess would have been a little embarrassing.

“Yes, let’s.” Sigmir agreed, shifting the carrying strap of her Lok’nar a little. It made me wonder if she actually was able to feel the minute changes to her weapon or if it was a subconscious action, that she knew her weapon had changed and a possible feeling of incongruity was in her head. Shaking my head, I followed the others out, closing the door behind me.

Outside, the day promised to be another wonderful late spring day, with a few clouds lazily drifting through a blue sky while the sun wasn’t hot enough to be uncomfortable, especially with my new gear. It was what I would call a perfect day, if I was on Earth.

A few dwarves had been waiting on us, especially the children who had been talking to the others over the last few days but also a few adults. They seemed to simply want to watch us head out, grinning and waving, making me wonder just how the others had become so popular, especially when they started waving back, as if to acknowledge specific people. Grinning to myself, I simply followed, letting the rest of my party bask in the attention, wondering what I had missed, holed up in the library.

But there were even people waiting for me, separately and only two, but they existed. Gelorin, the dwarves scholar was looking on from a higher tier of the city, giving me a nod when I focused on him, while Dargira, the dwarven Traveller who called the Hold her home was walking directly towards me. What gave me pause was that she wasn’t looking happy, a look that seemed to be equal parts dread, determination and despair on her face.

“Good morning, Dargira.” I greeted her, when she stepped up.

“Good morning, Morgana. I have a favour to ask.” she said, not sounding too happy. I gave her a nod, to make her continue and she closed her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath before speaking in a low voice.

“I told the Thane what I have inadvertently done. That I might have shared some images of what I have seen in the Hold and the Swamp with other Travellers. He was not too happy.” she began, making me wonder just what the favour would be. My mind instantly got to two plausible scenarios, she wanted me to talk to the Thane, trying to smooth things over or she wanted to join us. Neither appealed to me, trying to influence the Thane would require me to spend some sort of resource, quite possible something I didn’t have while taking her with us came with its own set of problems..

“That sounds understandable.” I said, nodding to myself. “But I don’t hear the favour just yet.” I pushed, trying to make her get to the point so I could decline.

“I would like to join your group, travelling with you.” she said in a rush, almost making it hard to understand. I paused for a second, trying to make it seem as if I was thinking it over. In actuality, there was no way I would agree without some very good reason, which I had not seen yet.

The most obvious problem was that I had a trait that would reduce my experience when taking her with me, something that luckily only applied to Travellers, I wasn’t willing to give up twenty percent experience-gain, just to take her with us.

Another, less obvious but even more damning problem was that it would require us to incorporate both of our schedules. Thanks to my deliberately emptied schedule, I could spend all my time in Mundus, other than a weekly visit to the dojo and short breaks for sustenance, bodily maintenance and training. And even that might go down a little, with my ability to stash my Avatar in my Hallow, letting Lenore carry me around, even when I wasn’t logged in.

Adding to it such simple problems like the massive level-difference and that she had already caused problems by posting information that shouldn’t be posted and I didn’t really need to think about it.

“That is sadly impossible.” I told her, after what I felt was an appropriate amount of consideration. I could see her face fall and I felt a little guilty. It wasn’t an emotion I was tremendously familiar with but I quickly decided I didn’t like it. It was curious, before coming to Mundus, I had heard of the different emotions but experiencing them was something else, entirely.

“I understand.” she nodded, trying to put on a brave face. It made me feel even worse, causing me to quickly wish her farewell and push Lenore out of her Hallow, before transferring into my own Hallow, as quick as I safely could. Letting freezingly cold clouds of pure darkness swirl around me helped calm me, isolating me from everything around me. Sometimes, emotions were a hassle.